Greephon

GREEPHON is an interdisciplinary research initiative exploring sustainability and resilience in quantum research ecosystems, led by Sofia Pazzagli. Hosted at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and funded by the Volkswagen Foundation, the project investigates how environmental impact can be understood, assessed, and meaningfully addressed within quantum optics and photonic laboratories. As quantum technologies continue to scale, research infrastructures face increasing pressure not only in terms of performance, but also energy consumption, resource use, supply chains, and long-term resilience. Despite this, structured approaches and shared frameworks to evaluate and improve sustainability in this context remain limited. GREEPHON takes a bottom-up and evidence-based approach. Its activities are grounded in pilot laboratories from the group of Prof. Rauschenbeutel, where measurement strategies, data access pathways, and operational constraints will be studied in detail. The project builds on an interdisciplinary perspective rooted in research excellence. Taking inspiration from sustainability frameworks developed for corporate environments, GREEPHON will co-developing approaches together with researchers, technical staff, and institutional actors to integrate sustainability into the logic and practice of scientific work. GREEPHON is conceived as a learning process. Its objective is to uncover barriers, test approaches, and co-develop strategies that are both actionable and scalable across research infrastructures. By bridging scientific practice, institutional processes, and policy perspectives, GREEPHON aims to contribute to a more sustainable and resilient development of quantum technologies.